What was Virginia's Landscape Like in 1910?

We have talked a lot about personal landscapes, or what kind of world you are living in at a particular time in your life. I found the following to be what my Aunt Virginia’s world looked like as she was growing up in Rockland, Maine.

In 1910, the year she was born, the census counted 8,174 souls living in the Rockland area. I don’t know what the population is today, but I believe it varies every few years as young people grow up and leave the area for opportunities elsewhere.

In the early 1900s Rockland was a big limestone center. Limestone was quarried in the North End up off the Old County Road near where Virginia lived with her family, the Winchenbaughs, up on West Meadow Road. These quarries have been recorded as the deepest in the world. The lime was then carried down to the kilns on the waterfront in the north end of the business district by horse and buggy or by the Limerock Railroad.

 Virginia might very well have seen buggies full of lime as she traveled up and down Kiln Hill (actually Shearer’s Lane). Roads were not paved and became very muddy in spring. Main Street was not paved with stone till the 1930s.

The winters were cold and the harbor froze solid enough to run a team of horses and a wagon over the ice to the outer islands. Men cut ice for household use up off Chikawauka Lake also using horse and wagon out on the ice. There were no snowplows, so a big open tall-sided wagon was used, pulled by a horse again, while teams of men were hired to throw the snow on Main Street up onto the wagon. I imagine they also tried to keep the trolley line open which ran through Main Street up as far as Glen Cove. Automobiles were not yet used by every family. Most got around with horses and wagons.

Besides all the smoke from the kilns on the waterfront, the harbor itself was full of every ship imaginable, from big schooners and steam ships to pleasure boats. Steamships made regular runs between Rockland and Bangor and Rockland and Portland. The Penobscot ran from Boston to Bangor. Passengers often used the steamers instead of trying to get to someplace via a horse and buggy on an old rutted, dirt road.

There was railroad passenger service from Rockland to Bath on the Knox and Lincoln Railroad which was taken over by the Maine Central Railroad in 1901. The building used for a train station still stands on the corner of Pleasant and Union Streets. It wasn’t built till 1917 so it wasn’t in Virginia’s landscape till then. Passenger service ended in 1959 but we are seeing a resurgence with the summer trade. The building itself has been used for many purposes. At one time it held the City offices. I went there to register to vote when I was 21.

Daily life around 1910 wasn’t easy either. Most people used wood stoves to keep warm. Most also had wells and no running water inside or inside plumbing. Outhouses were used. I don’t know if the Winchenbaugh’s had electricity at the house in 1910, but they had no phone. This was the norm for families at that time. Main Street didn’t get street lights till 1905.

As for some of the other buildings and businesses that existed in 1910 we have first of all, the Poor House and the Pest House up near Dodges Mountain. The phrase, “You’re going to put me in the Poor House” really had meaning at that time. The Pest House was used to isolate people with highly communicable diseases, of which tuberculosis would be high on the list. At that time there were also blacksmiths and livery stables. In some cases stagecoach service existed like the one owned by George Lynde, who owned the Lynde Hotel and livery service at that location. He ran a stagecoach between Rockland and St. George. I don’t know if the service was still in existence in 1910 but it’s likely.

Down on Main Street, Virginia might have passed by the biggest and most important store that existed at that time, Fuller, Cobb, Davis in the Syndicate Building. That building later held the H.H. Crie Co. hardware store. The Cooper Kettle on Limerock Street, didn’t exist till 1911. The Thorndike Hotel was there as well as the Rockland Hotel, which burned in the 1952 fire. The Bay Point Hotel, was remodeled, refurbished, and reopened as The Samoset in 1902 out at Jameson’s Point.

So there you have it, Virginia’s personal landscape from 1910 on during her childhood and young adulthood. Most of the information for this piece came from two publications published by the Rockland Historical Society, Shore Village Album and Shore Village Story. For more complete information on the history of Rockland, contact the society at their office below the Rockland Public Library on Union Street, which by the way was not opened till 1903, just a mere seven years before Virginia was born.